Is there any chance that whoever is responsible for the bins in Rye (the town council? the district council?) would consider replacing the bin next to Knoops hot chocolate shop by the Landgate with something a little less bird friendly? As I walked past on Saturday, a clever gull liberated a discarded ice cream waffle cone from the open topped bin. She immediately attracted a lot of smaller brown headed admirers who begged to share to the treat. An unlucky pigeon came late to the party and retrieved what looked like a dog poo bag from the bin. He did not make any friends.
What you can’t see in the picture is the pile of discarded drinks containers, left a couple of feet from the bin. As usual, animals and birds are relatively clean and tidy compared with their human underlings.
Photo: Seana Lanigan
Image Credits: Seana Lanigan .
Sadly a lot of the filth is left neatly tied up in bin bags,after the weekenders go home and unfortunately as we have seen in west street,by the time the bin men arrive, the gulls have shredded the bags,also the increasing rubbish left for too long at gibbets marsh, is causing rats to,congregate there,as twice depositing glass there,I have seen them scurrying about.
Some years ago at the time I was a Town Councillor I was on a committee of the Rye Partnership looking into townscape, and amongst matters then discussed was the need to replace the existing open litter bins with closed ones. A survey was conducted and the Rye Partnership decided to do something about it. Finance was found by the Rye Partnership of which part was to be utilised for new bins. Many were changed and the “tulip” open bins got rid of. However, it seems we still have a few open bins scattered about, and it would be useful if the Council could organise there own survey to see how many open bins are still in use. Then possibly funds could be found to replace these too. Perhaps the seagulls will stop making our town less of a mess , but it also need people to ensure their rubbish goes in the bins and not be discarded on the ground.